It didn't come as a big surprise to me to read the Orchard is in trouble. My thoughts are with the people that represent the 20% and that have been working hard to make the Orchard what it is today. Being an aggregator made sense when the digital business started of years ago, but IMHO will not be a viable business for much longer. This is why we at IIP have created FUGA, a platform that connects the dots and that puts the day to day business in the hands of the content owners, this with less hassle then working with an aggregator.
The revenue share business model most aggregators apply, is not going to work in the long run. The margins will go down and the cost will go up due to all the innovation and marketing push that is going to be required to stay on top of the game of making people buy their music online. The fact that aggregators have a value for being the 'aggregator' of content from a DSP pov, since especially the big ones dont want to deal with the legal aspect of making a contract with thousands of content providers stays for a while, but this issue can be resolved in a totally different way. In any case lots of reasons why aggregators are facing a tough future and lots of opportunity to get into this space with a better solution. One solution is that aggregators start outsourcing the tech (Preferably to IIP ;-) and start to focus on helping music companies to sell and market their product better. Representing millions of works is not the way frwd. Focus and know how of the music and the target market will soon prove to be key. I wish the Orchard all the best in their quest to make a difference, but think they should make a radical change in order to survive.
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